Chapter 4 - THE LIST OF FIFTEEN
Z
By noon, Kate Bennett knew all fifteen names.
She wished she did not.
Damon had not intended to show her the list.
Kate insisted.
“It happened to me.”
“You don’t need their faces inside your head.”
“They’re already there.”
Damon studied her.
Then handed over the folder.
Preston Caldwell.
Grant Ellis.
Nathan Burke.
Charles Whitmore.
Evan Sloan.
Eric Voss.
Nine others.
Some were wealthy.
Two were married.
One had daughters.
Another ran a charity dedicated to “empowering young women.”
Kate stared at that biography for several seconds.
“This is disgusting.”
“Yes.”
“How many actually touched anyone?”
“We don’t know yet.”
“How many helped hide it?”
“At least eleven.”
Kate closed the folder.
“And the other four?”
“Watched.”
Her jaw tightened.
Damon understood.
Sometimes watching was participation.
Sometimes silence was the weapon.
He had learned that years ago.
Kate noticed his expression.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s twice today you’ve said nothing when you meant something.”
Damon leaned against the hospital-room wall.
“My sister was twenty.”
Kate looked up.
He had never mentioned a sister.
“Her name was Sofia.”
“What happened?”
“She went to college in Boston.”
His voice changed.
“She dated someone my father approved of.”
Kate waited.
“He hit her.”
A terrible stillness settled between them.
“Sofia hid it.”
“Why?”
“For the same reason you did.”
Kate understood immediately.
Power.
Family.
Fear.
“Did your father know?”
“Eventually.”
“And?”
“He offered the boy’s family money to keep it quiet.”
Kate stared.
Damon’s eyes went distant.
“He said publicity would damage Sofia more than him.”
“What did you do?”
“I was nineteen.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Damon looked at her.
“I broke his jaw.”
Kate said nothing.
“I thought that would fix something.”
“Did it?”
“No.”
“What happened to Sofia?”
“She left.”
“Where?”
“California.”
A pause.
“She died three years later.”
Kate’s breath caught.
“How?”
“Car accident.”
He looked toward the window.
“She had been drinking.”
Kate’s anger softened.
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
For the first time, Kate understood why Damon had looked at her broken arm as if he had seen a ghost.
He had.
The hospital door opened.
Matteo entered.
“We need to move.”
Damon straightened.
“What?”
“Security caught a man using a staff badge that doesn’t belong to him.”
Kate’s stomach dropped.
“Here?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“Former Capitol Police. Works private protection for Caldwell.”
Damon turned toward Kate.
“We’re leaving.”
“I’m not hiding.”
“This isn’t hiding.”
“It sounds like hiding.”
“It’s staying alive long enough to decide what you want.”
That ended the argument.
Twenty minutes later, Kate and Evelyn were moved through a private loading entrance into a black SUV.
Kate sat beside Damon.
Her mother sat ahead with Dr. Reyes.
“You’re taking us to your house.”
“Yes.”
“The house where this happened.”
“No.”
Kate looked over.
Damon’s face was unreadable.
“Blackwell estate is one property.”
“Where are we going?”
“My grandmother’s.”
Kate nearly laughed.
“Eleanor Blackwell?”
“Yes.”
“The woman who terrifies the kitchen staff?”
“She terrifies me too.”
Kate finally smiled.
They drove thirty minutes north.
Eleanor’s house was smaller than the estate but still enormous by normal standards.
The eighty-one-year-old woman waited on the steps wearing black trousers and holding a cane she appeared more likely to use as a weapon than support.
When Kate stepped out, Eleanor looked at her cast.
“Which hand did he break?”
“My right.”
“Pity.”
Kate blinked.
Eleanor pointed to the cast.
“If it were the left, you could still slap him properly with the right.”
Damon closed his eyes briefly.
“Grandmother.”
“What?”
Kate laughed.
For the first time since the storage room, she laughed for real.
Eleanor took her inside.
By evening, the house had transformed into a command center.
Lawyers arrived.
A former prosecutor arrived.
Two journalists Damon trusted were put on standby.
Copies of every file went to three different secure servers.
Kate watched the process.
“You planned for this.”
Damon shook his head.
“I planned for people trying to destroy evidence.”
“You really trust journalists?”
“More than politicians.”
“That’s a low bar.”
He almost smiled again.
Then Matteo entered.
His face erased the humor.
“We have a problem.”
Damon stood.
“Caldwell filed a kidnapping complaint.”
Kate stared.
“Against you?”
“Against Damon and six members of staff,” Matteo said.
“Preston told police he was held at gunpoint.”
“Was he?”
Matteo glanced at Damon.
“No.”
Kate caught the hesitation.
“Matteo.”
He cleared his throat.
“No gun was pointed at him.”
“That is a very specific answer.”
Damon interrupted.
“Enough.”
Matteo continued.
“There’s something else.”
He placed a photograph on the table.
A young woman leaving an apartment.
Kate’s blood went cold.
“That’s my sister.”
Rachel Bennett.
The sister who had not called in two years.
Damon looked at Matteo.
“Where?”
“Tucson.”
“When?”
“Forty minutes ago.”
“Why are we looking at her?”
Matteo placed a second picture beside it.
A man stood near Rachel’s car.
Kate did not recognize him.
Damon did.
“Caldwell security.”
Kate rose so quickly her chair fell backward.
“No.”
Damon was already reaching for his phone.
“Get Phoenix people there.”
“Already moving.”
Kate grabbed Damon’s sleeve with her left hand.
“If they touch her—”
“They won’t.”
“You can’t promise that.”
Damon looked directly into her eyes.
“No.”
She was right.
He could not.
So he changed the promise.
“But I can promise she will not face them alone.”
Kate released him.
Damon began issuing orders.
May you like
And three states away, Rachel Bennett walked toward her car completely unaware that a man had been following her for eleven minutes.
Or that two black vehicles had just turned onto her street.
